In a widely circulated memo this week, environmental groups boasted that they're "poised to execute the last phase of our biggest and most sophisticated electoral effort ever." They're on track to spend $85 million, they said, including $40 million on six Senate races. Not only are environmental groups spending record amounts of cash on the races, they are also trumpeting a common vision with what advocates call an unprecedented level of coordination. And they vow it will last through future elections. But their critics say the environmental community's clout has made the movement more pragmatic at the expense of core values, including defeating the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

It's been more than six months since rancher Cliven Bundy's standoff with the Bureau of Land Management in the Nevada desert rekindled a national debate over who owns federal lands in the West, but the issue is still fresh in voters' minds. The lands debate has surfaced in several races for national and state offices -- a sign that who tends parks, forests and public lands matters to voters.

BEIJING -- It was first criticized by environmentalists. Then it was reined in by government officials. Now, China's coal-fueled synthetic natural gas industry faces another blow as a group of energy experts raise doubt over its economic viability.

A sweeping new report on clean energy development in 55 emerging economies suggests the United States and Europe may soon be eclipsed by countries from Asia, Latin America and Africa on several measures of clean energy adoption.

NEW YORK -- It's no secret New Yorkers have turned to Queens and Brooklyn in search of cheaper rents and a less hectic lifestyle than Manhattan. What is less well understood is how that shift will rapidly boost electricity demand and strain the power grid in an area that might best be described as a tangled cross-section of this city's growing outer boroughs.

Peter Keisler might be the only lawyer who's argued five cases before the Supreme Court and has appeared in a TV soap commercial. The commercial and some voiceovers on a PBS children's show came when Keisler was a teen actor. "It quickly became clear to me that acting was a tough business and that I wasn't that good at it," he recalled in an interview. "Decent enough to land a few minor parts in small matters from time to time, but certainly not possessed of the talent to make a successful career out of it." He's done OK in his second career choice. A former acting attorney general in George W. Bush's administration and nominee to a federal appeals court bench, Keisler has established himself as a go-to guy for industry on Clean Air Act cases at the Supreme Court.

A public affairs firm run by former senior aides to President Obama has worked to promote Republican Rep. Lee Terry's re-election bid in Nebraska while also working against one of the issues he championed: the Keystone XL pipeline.